Monero Address Types Explained: Standard, Subaddress and Integrated
Short answer: Monero has three address formats. A standard address is 95 characters and starts with 4. A subaddress is also 95 characters but starts with 8. An integrated address is 106 characters, starts with 4, and has a payment ID built into it. Individuals should generally use subaddresses; businesses receiving automated payments are the case where integrated addresses still make sense.
Key points
- Standard = 95 chars, starts with 4. Subaddress = 95 chars, starts with 8. Integrated = 106 chars, starts with 4.
- Integrated addresses are not deprecated. Long payment IDs were removed in release 0.15 — integrated addresses were not.
- Reusing a Monero address does not create on-chain clustering, unlike Bitcoin. Your published address never appears on the blockchain.
- A view key reveals incoming payments; a spend key can move funds. They are not interchangeable.
- Restore height too high = missing transactions. When unsure, set it lower.
What are the three address types?
| Type | Length | Starts with | Use it for |
|---|---|---|---|
| Standard | 95 | 4 | Your main wallet address |
| Subaddress | 95 | 8 | Everyday receiving — one per payer |
| Integrated | 106 | 4 | Automated business/exchange receiving |
All three encode a public spend key and a public view key, plus a checksum, in Monero's own Base58 alphabet. That alphabet deliberately omits 0, O, I and l so characters cannot be confused visually, and the trailing checksum means a mistyped address is rejected by your wallet rather than silently sending funds nowhere.
One detail that surprises people: subaddress index (0,0) is the standard address itself. Subaddresses and accounts are a wallet-level convenience — they are not part of consensus, and the network does not know or care how you organise them.
Should you use subaddresses or integrated addresses?
A lot of writing online claims integrated addresses are deprecated. That is wrong, and it is worth being precise because the distinction is practical.
What was actually removed were long (32-byte) payment IDs, dropped in release 0.15. They caused real problems: they could link a user's transactions if reused, they had to be attached separately so people forgot them and needed support to recover funds, and only one could be used per transaction, which stopped services batching withdrawals.
Integrated addresses survived because they solve a different problem. The 8-byte payment ID inside them is encrypted on-chain, so it is not publicly visible. And crucially for a business: generating an integrated address requires no private key, whereas generating a subaddress requires the private view key. A payment processor can therefore mint integrated addresses without ever touching your wallet keys.
| You are… | Use | Why |
|---|---|---|
| An individual receiving payments | Subaddresses | Unlinkable per payer, no ID handling |
| A business with automated receiving | Integrated addresses | No wallet key needed to generate; no shared index to sync |
One limitation: a single transaction cannot pay to multiple integrated addresses. If you accept Monero commercially, our guide on accepting Monero payments covers the gateway side.
Does reusing a Monero address hurt privacy?
Not on-chain — and this is the single biggest misconception carried over from Bitcoin.
Monero uses stealth addresses: the sender generates a fresh one-time address for every payment on the recipient's behalf. You can publish one address forever and every payment to it still lands on a unique, unlinkable address in the blockchain. Your published address never appears on-chain at all. Reusing it creates none of the address clustering that makes Bitcoin reuse a privacy problem.
The leak is off-chain. If you give the same address to five different people, those five can compare notes and realise they are paying the same entity. That is why the recommendation is still one subaddress per payer — it protects you from the people you transact with, not from chain analysts.
Two honest caveats most guides skip:
- The Janus attack. A determined service, or several colluding, can actively probe whether two subaddresses belong to the same wallet. If you need genuinely perfect unlinkability, the only complete answer is a separate wallet with a separate seed.
- Don't sweep everything at once. Consolidating many subaddress balances into your main address in a single transaction links those subaddresses together on-chain. Use separate transactions if that matters.
View key vs spend key
| Key | What it allows | Safe to share? |
|---|---|---|
| Private spend key | Signing — i.e. moving your funds | Never |
| Private view key | Seeing incoming transactions | Only with someone you trust |
The spend key is effectively an alternate form of your seed and can derive your other keys. The view key is narrower — but note Monero's own documentation warns that a view key alone cannot reliably show outgoing transactions, so the balance in a view-only wallet should not be trusted as complete. Handing your view key to an accountant shows them money coming in, not the full picture.
Restore height: the most common wallet problem
If you restore a wallet from your seed and the balance looks wrong or empty, the cause is almost always the restore height — the block your wallet starts scanning from. Set it after your first incoming transaction and that payment is invisible.
The rule is simple: too high loses transactions; too low only costs scanning time. When in doubt, go lower and be patient. Also worth knowing that subaddress labels are not recovered from a seed — only the addresses themselves are re-derived, so your naming is lost even though your funds are not.
Choosing a wallet first? See our wallet comparison or browse 35 wallets across mobile, desktop, hardware and CLI.
Frequently asked questions
Why does my Monero address start with 8 instead of 4?
Because it is a subaddress. Standard addresses start with 4; subaddresses start with 8. Both are 95 characters and both work normally — most wallets hand you a subaddress by default.
What is a Monero integrated address?
A 106-character address with an 8-byte payment ID built in, letting a business match an incoming payment to an order without a separate field. The payment ID is encrypted on-chain, and generating one requires no private key.
Are integrated addresses deprecated?
No. Long 32-byte payment IDs were removed in release 0.15, but integrated addresses remain supported and are still the recommended option for automated business receiving.
Is it safe to reuse the same Monero address?
On-chain, yes — stealth addresses mean each payment lands on a unique one-time address, so there is no clustering. The risk is off-chain: different payers can recognise the same published address.
Can someone steal my Monero if I share my address?
No. A public address only lets people send you funds. Only your private spend key (or seed) can move money, and that should never be shared.
Why is my restored wallet showing a zero balance?
Usually the restore height is set too late, so the wallet has not scanned the blocks containing your transactions — or it is simply still syncing. Lower the restore height and let it rescan.
Address formats verified against Monero project documentation, September 2026. Formats are unchanged by any pending protocol upgrade.